CLEVELAND — Joe Maddon celebrated
quietly in his office with a postgame light beer. It would have been
understandable if he was spraying champagne.
After nearly five years and 18
straight losses, the Tampa Bay Rays finally won in Cleveland.
"It had to happen at some point," said
Maddon, the Rays' bespectacled manager. "I'm glad it happened tonight
and we got it over with."
David Price held it together after a
rocky start, getting a three-run homer from Ben Zobrist and a solo shot
from Carlos Pena as the Rays ended a losing streak in Cleveland dating
to 2005 with a 6-3 win over the Indians on Saturday night.
Price (13-5) trailed 3-0 in the
second, but the AL's All-Star game starter settled in. He allowed three
hits in seven-plus innings, tied CC Sabathia for the league lead in wins
and ended Tampa Bay's five-summers-long winless drought at Progressive
Field.
"That's a tough streak to have in
baseball, it doesn't matter what team you're playing," Price said. "It's
kind of amazing."
The Rays' last win Cleveland came on
Sept. 28, 2005, when they were still known as the Devil Rays and were
three years from a World Series visit. It was Maddon's first win ever in
Cleveland, snapping a 21-game slide he began as California's interim
skipper in 1996.
"I stink here. I'm horrendous here,"
Maddon joked. "I'm horrible. I didn't know it was as easy as acquiring
an Indian and then you have a chance to win."
Maddon was referring to Rays catcher
Kelly Shoppach, who spent 3 1/2 seasons in Cleveland before the Indians
traded him to Tampa Bay in December.
"If you can't beat them, have one of
them join you," Maddon said.
Zobrist's replay-reversed homer off
former Rays pitcher Mitch Talbot (8-9) tied it at 3 in the fifth, and
Pena's shot put Tampa Bay ahead in the sixth.
Shelley Duncan hit a two-run homer
for the Indians.
If the Rays were going to end their
Cleveland curse, Price figured to be the guy to do it. But coming off
his worst start of the season against the Yankees, the left-hander was
in trouble and in a 3-0 hole after allowing Duncan's sixth homer of the
season in the second inning.
But after giving up a one-out single
in the fourth, he retired 11 straight before being pulled after a
leadoff walk in the eighth. Joaquin Benoit gave up a two-out single to
Shin-Soo Choo but struck out Carlos Santana on a 3-2 pitch to end the
threat.
Rafael Soriano worked the ninth for
his 25th save in 27 tries.
Price was pleased with the way he
rebounded after giving up seven runs in just five innings in his
previous start.
"In New York, that hurt a little bit
so it was good to come out here," Price said. "Innings three through
seven were kind of good. The first two were kind of shaky. They scored
runs in the first two innings and I knew I had to put a stop to it or we
were going to lose."
Indians manager Manny Acta knew his
team's puzzling stranglehold over the Rays would end at some point.
"The way you stop streaks is you
score six runs and you have David Price on the mound," Acta said. "I'd
take that against the '27 Yankees."
Pena hit his 21st homer in the sixth,
when the Rays chased Talbot, who dominated them early but couldn't keep
them down for long.
Matt Joyce followed Pena's homer with
a double, and with two outs, B.J. Upton's ground-rule RBI double gave
the Rays a 5-3 lead and ended Talbot's night. He recorded six
consecutive strikeouts against his first seven batters, but was touched
up for two homers, two doubles, two singles and five runs against the
last nine he faced.
Held to one hit by Talbot through
four, the Rays finally got to him in the fifth, scoring three runs – all
with two outs – to tie it.
Shoppach, who came to Tampa Bay in
the trade for Talbot, singled and Jason Bartlett grounded a base hit to
right. Zobrist then lined a 1-0 pitch to left that appeared to clear the
wall but was initially ruled in play by the umpires.
After Zobrist hustled into third with
a triple, Maddon asked for the umpires to convene, believing the ball
had struck the metal railing above the 19-foot-high wall. The umpires
left to look at a TV replay and needed only 80 seconds to determine that
Zobrist's shot was indeed a three-run homer.
Perhaps wanting to show the Rays what
they gave up on, Talbot was dialed in from the start.
He struck out two in the first, the
side in the second, and fanned B.J. Upton to start the third, giving him
six straight strikeouts – a new career-high for a game – and a share of
the club record shared by Bob Feller (1938), Bartolo Colon (2000) and
Chuck Finley (2002).
With a chance to break the mark,
Talbot retired Shoppach on a grounder to short.
"Coming up with that team, you kind
of want to get them a little bit," Talbot said. "I played with most of
those guys."
Notes
Bartlett was hit by pitches in
the seventh and ninth. … Choo made a sliding catch to rob Upton in
the fifth. … Indians closer Kerry Wood, on the disabled list with a
finger blister, will throw a bullpen session in the next two days.
Manager Manny Acta said the team will evaluate Wood after the workout
before determining when he'll be activated. Wood could draw trade
interest before the July 31 deadline.